POLICE RADIO NETS BANDITS
Pair Identified as Robbers of Pasadena Store Caught Nine Minutes and Thirty Seconds Later
LOS ANGELES TIMES –PASADENA, November 17, 1930 –Success of the new police radio broadcasting system was further demonstrated today when two armed bandits who just held-up the MacMarr grocery store at 60 North Lake avenue were captured nine minutes and thirty seconds after the bold crime was committed.
The suspects, Elvon Adamson and Joseph R. Jarred, are asserted to have driven away in their automobile at a high rate of speed after collecting $50 from three MacMarr clerks whom they forced into the meat department ice box at pistol point.
While the bandits were making an unsuccessful attempt to open the store safe, Fred Schwoerer of 1092 North Catalina avenue, one of the victims, seized the oppportunity to peer out of the door and obtain a description of the robbers’ automobile which they had parked in the rear of the building.
As the gunmen dashed for their machine, Schwoerer telephoned a description of the men and the car to the police, paying no attention to threats of death if the employees moved from the ice box. The report of the robbery and the descriptions were immediately broadcast to patrol cars by D.R. Hamilton, police radio announcer.
Patrolmen H.D. Mallone and C.B. Lay were cruising about near the intersection of South El Molino avenue and Alpine street when they received orders through the patrol car’s radio receiver to halt the bandits in the event they tried to escape toward Los Angeles via South Fair Oaks avenue.
At the intersection of Fair Oaks and Glenarm street, the officers saw a car speeding south which answered the description and succeeded in overtaking it after a half-mile chase.
One of the bandit suspects attempted to snatch his revolver from its holster, but Lay “beat him to the draw,” and the prisoners were handcuffed after surrendering their revolvers.
They described themselves as Joseph R. Jarred, 25 years of age, 5868 San Pedro street, Los Angeles, and Elvon Adamson, 20, of 2661 South Strathmore street, Wilmar. They denied implication in the hold-up, but were identified by their victims.
Because of crowded conditions in the old jail, and to prevent them from communicating, the suspects won the doubtful honor of being the first orthodox inmates of the new $200,000 jail building on North Broadway which will be formally opened within a few days.
The arresting officers, both of whom are members of the police football team which meets the firemen in the Rose Bowl Friday night, were congratulated by Chief of Police Charles H. Kelley.
“The radio system, the first police broadcaster in the State, now promises to be our finest line of defense against the underworld,” Chief Kelley declared.
